Food Profile: Crab Cakes

If there is one thing my family knows well, it’s crab. From as long as I can remember, and much before I was born, crab has been a staple of the families, weather that be at Thanksgiving dinner or a potluck, crab was on the menu. My father is a crabber and my mother a crab broker, or in other words, my father catches it and my mom sells it to restaurants and stores. There are pictures of me in diapers sitting on my father’s boat as he reels in crab pots, just as there are pictures of my dad in diapers witching his father. Crab is truly something that has been in the family for generations.

Now much like any crustacean, crab is something that can be prepared in many different ways. It can be eaten raw, boiled and eaten out of the shell, mixed with almost any salad or pasta, the list goes on and on. But none of those compare to the crab cake, and more specifically, my mother’s crab cake. Her recipe, like many great recipes, was once written down on a piece of scratch paper, and has been rewritten several times due to gobs of this and that. Through time the recipe has evolved, and although slightly different than the original, is twice as good. The ingredients are not measured with instruments as they are with taste, and so no two batches are exactly the same.

Originally, the crab cake was something that was invented by English settlers due to the economy. Crab was expensive (although not much has changed there) and people wanted a way to stretch the key ingredient. They mashed the meat and combine it with fillers to make little cakes that would go further than just eating the meat on its own. The meal was so popular though, that is stuck, and soon crab cakes grew from being a way to make the meat last, to using as much meat as possible in higher end restaurants.

The majority of people I have spoken to say they have tried crab cakes at one point or another. After surveying a few dozen people I realized something, crab cakes are something that are either served at a fish-n-chips sort of place, or they’re served along side a pricy salad at a fancy restaurant. As it turns out, crab cakes are a dish that adapt to their surroundings. Although quite different in taste, crab cakes can be consumed on almost any budget. This is primarily because crab has such a great variety. The crab that I have grown up eating is Dungeness, a local crab that is considered sweeter than other crabs. The Dungeness crab that my family has always caught and sold is wild, and delivered within hours of its catch. I’ve never eaten cab at home that wasn’t less then a few days out of water, and if you were to eat at any of the restaurants they sell to, neither have you. Because of the high quality of crab meat, and the freshness, and crab cake at a fancy place will run you about eighteen bucks. This is much different than the crab cakes at the fish-n-chips place, where a crab cake will run you five bucks. This crab is not fresh, in fact, it’s probably not even crab. Most likely it’s “krab”, which is a combination of Pollock (a bottom-feeder found most prominently in the Bering Sea) and other white fish. It’s essentially the same imitation crabmeat which most California rolls at a sushi place is. But, if it genuine crab which they are using, there’s a good chance it’s Snow crab from China, which again, has been frozen and shipped. What is really comes down to is the quality of product dictating the type of crab cake.

The first time I tried a crab cake, which was not my mother’s, was at a fish-n-chips place called the Shrimp Shack in Bellingham. The only real reason I even tried it was because it was made from crab that my mother had sold to them, (the same crab that she makes her crab cakes out of) and was being sold quite inexpensively. Needless to say, I thought they were OK, but couldn’t believe they were using such expensive crabmeat to make them. Ironically, they finally figured it out too, and no longer make their crab cakes out of fresh Dungeness crab, but frozen Snow crab, and as you can imagine, they aren’t nearly as good, but they turn a greater profit.


So as it turns out, from a very young age, I have been exposed to a gourmet meal, without ever realizing it. At first, when coming to that realization, I felt a bit snobbish, and naive even. But in reality, my family never had much money, and so we used what we had, which was crab. In fact, when I was really young, we didn’t have heating in our house, but we had gourmet crab cakes. What it comes down to is what we grow up with becomes so normal, that it’s hard for us to see otherwise. Just as a mechanics daughter never has to pay to get her car fixed, a crabbers daughter never had to pay for good crab cakes.


I believe food is made to be shared, and so, this recipe makes about 50 crab cakes. Also, you can image how important I feel the crab is to the recipe so please use fresh Dungeness. This recipe make crab cakes that are about 80% crab.
Mom’s Crab Cake Recipe

- 5 lbs Fresh Dungeness Crab – shucked
- 3 Whole Eggs
- 2 Cups Olive Oil
- 2 Red Bell Peppers
- 2 oz. Fresh Basil
- 1/4 C Parsley
- 1/4 C Green Onions
- 1/4 C Lemon Juice
- 1/8 C Vinegar (red or white)
- 1 Tablespoon Paprika
- 1 Teaspoon salt
- Pepper to taste
- Bread crumbs/panko

- In processor whip eggs for 2 minutes. Add oil in slow steady stream until thickened.

- Transfer into mixing bowl

- In processor, combine and mix peppers, basil, parsley, green onions, paprika, salt and pepper

- Add contents of processor to mixing bowl of eggs and oil and stir

- Stir in lemon juice and vinegar

- Add bread crumbs/panko and crab meat to desired consistency

- Cook on low heat (flipping) on the stove until browned on both sides

Behind the Scenes

A few days ago I went to bottle the beer which I had brewed at Gallagher's Brewing up in Edmonds. The brewing process, which takes a few hours, I had done a few weeks before as the beer takes a few weeks to ferment. As a devotee to fine beers, I was excited to see what goes into the brewing process. Little did I know it was so intensive. There are many steps which have to preformed just right in order to create a beer that is drinkable. It starts with the wheat, which has to be just the right amount added at just the right time, and following is the malt and hops, which also need to be just right. And then of course there's the yeast, which without there would be no beer. Every ingredient was necessary at every precise time to produce what you were shooting for, or in other words, there was no "winging it".

There was something to be said though, after it was all bottled and I was sipping on something I had created for going out on a limb and trying to create something which I had no prior knowledge of. The same I think goes for the pizza bake on Thursday. Although I had to leave early, and didn't actually get to try the pizza, seeing what goes into a wood fire oven was worth the work. It started with the fire, and really for as long as I was there, it ended with the fire. Getting that fire started turned out to be a bigger ordeal than I thought it would be. You have to start with the newspaper, and then kindling, slowly working up to bigger and bigger pieces of wood until the fire is hot enough to actually cook something. Then of course you have to make sure the fire doesn't collapse on itself, which turned out to be a bigger issue than anyone saw coming. All in all though I was happy to help and I now have a new found respect for wood fire bakers.

I believe everyone at one point should go see how its done. Weather that be a pizza bake or a brewery, there's a lot more that goes into crating the things that we love to consume than most people think, and there's a lot of respect to give to those who create them.

Home Dumpster Diving

A few days ago while raiding for my kitchen for something to eat, I stumbled upon some almost rotten bananas which I had forgotten about. My fist instinct, (which I'm not proud of ) was to toss them and forget I ever had them. Right as they were headed for dumpster doom however, I thought back to class, and the discussions we've been having about wasting food. Holding two mushy bananas in my hand I realized they could amount to much more than just garbage. Hunting through my cabinet I found enough ingredients to make banana bread. It was then I realized, in the two years I have lived in the same house, I'd thrown out countless bananas that have gone bad, and all the time had all the ingredients necessary for making banana bread. Slightly appalled at myself, I became more determined then ever to create a meal out of what I could find around my kitchen. A few hours later the house smelled like banana bread and I was quite proud of myself, I had made something out of nothing, food from the dumpster.

My banana bread creation got me thinking, how many times had a similar situation occurred and I had simply decided to go out to eat, or but something new. I started to realize that although I'm a student, and try to budget myself accordingly, I don't always eat like one. I constantly toss out old vegetables, which I feel are no longer fresh enough. It was then I decided, that I in order to actually make change, I was going to have to start living differently. I've rallied my roommates and we now make an effort to not only eat what is on its way out, but to share what we would normally let sit as leftovers in the fridge until moldy. We have started making meals with what we have, instead of buying new ingredients. I've found that by combining our odds and ends we not only do our part in not overly tossing, but it creates a family-like feel to our otherwise separated household. Cooking is an activity after all which brings people together.